Encore
by JadeWing
Summary: A near-fatal accident makes Meimi decide to give up her work as Saint Tail, to both her and Asuka Jr.'s misery. Three years later, our favorite juvenile detective is still clueless to Saint Tail's identity, but that may not last when she must return...


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Encore

Chapter One: Tonight, I Will Come Back

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Who would have thought? JadeWing, the ever-annoying-and-infamous-for-killing-off-main-characters, is writing a Saint Tail fic. Huh. Oh, well. What can I say, I read the manga and it was just too darn cute and fluffy for me to resist. Haven't seen the anime yet, so you'll have to forgive me, but I have read the entire series and I only had to alter a few things for this to workWhat things am I talking about? You'll just have to find out! Any and all reviews are appreciated (and read, in case you're wondering).

Disclaimer: ::clamped onto Asuka Jr. plushy:: NO! YOU CAN'T TAKE THAT AWAY FROM ME! HE'S MINE, MINE I SAY! MIIIIIIINE!

Just kidding. I'm willing to share. ^_^

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It was the night that nearly cost them both their lives; where everything had gone wrong; when she had only through the barest luck and iron determination made it out without exposing her identity.

That was when she'd hung up the hat. Hid the costume away. Her magic tricks–well, her father continued to teach her any new ones he came up with, and she could always pull out her supplies and do a half-hearted feat just to reaffirm that she had the skills. It wasn't often, however–it hurt to look at them and remember what she'd done.

They were both lucky. So lucky, it was almost a sin. They could have died–would have, but it was as if the Lord had helped _her_ that one time, acknowledging her service to Him.

Since the three fateful years since that accident, Seira had merely tipped the police off as an anonymous caller. It worked fine.

But it wasn't Saint Tail, and everyone felt it.

Meimi Haneoka, now seventeen, stared out the window to the night sky beyond. A giant moon gazed serenely back at her, adding soft shine to her long strawberry-blond hair. Her blue eyes were distant and slightly damp, but she always had cried easily. She'd cried more than usual when she'd made the decision to give up her nighttime adventuresnot to mention the pursuit of a certain detective.

How had it happened? What were the odds?

A sigh escaped her lips as she closed her eyes, plummeting down the well of memory.

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Saint Tail grinned slyly, watching Asuka Jr. pace nervously around the room the vase was displayed in. Of course, that wasn't the real vase: they'd tried to set her up. He'd gotten even better, but Seira was destined to be a lawyer, not a nun, the way she could get information out of people. 

Wellbetter to let them assume their plan had worked, then. The lights were going to go off, thanks to her present to Mr. Fuse Box in three secondsone.

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Bzzzt.

"She's here!" one of the guards yelled, his voice agitated, and with good reason. Her reputation had swollen as fast as one of her balloons over the past yearfunny how that worked.

A flick, and a cutout of her slid into place over the skylight, making it seem as if she was standing there, then slipped away in the opposite direction she was going.

"Hold on! That may **not** be her and if it isn't, she's going to take the vase!" That was Asuka; definitely Asuka. His voice had gotten deeper with that two inches he'd gained over the past few months. Men; they grew like weeds and were just as annoying. 

She stuck her tongue out derisively and scampered over to the drainpipe. It was the room below their stakeout that held the vase; getting to it would be a piece of cheesecake. 

"The room has doors that lead to a balcony–it's on the fourth floor," Seira had told her. " It needs repairing and it's a little shaky, but you should be fine."

Landing lightly, she felt it tremble slightly, but the wood held despite its creaking warnings. The doors opened easily enough–they were only locked, and locks meant nothing to Saint Tail.

She glided inside as silently as a shadow and immediately her eyes found the vase, shut in behind glass casing. 

Like **that** was going to be any good. It was child's play to lift the casing and pick up the vase. 

Then the child's play got older.

"Thought you'd be down here," a familiar voice said indifferently. "You took too long to come in upstairs."

She could barely keep herself from whirling around to face him, to find him, because the lights were bound to come on sometime soon and he'd see her full-on. "Guess what–so did I. I guess we have something in common," she said cautiously. If he'd speak again, she could locate him by the sound

There was a rustle behind her, and she felt fingertips brush her shoulder. Feinting to the right, she ducked under an arm and threw open the door, face afire. So close–they'd been so close! He'd **touched** her!

"No you don't!" A fist wrapped around her forearm just before she could leap into the trees beyond the balcony, footsteps thudding ominously onto the wood.

Her heart let out a single, frantic beat that echoed in her ears before the floor beneath their feet shook violently, shrieked like a dying creature, and pitched them both into the inky darkness below. 

Flailing wildly, her arm hit a branch. A snap sent shivers running through her, shortly followed by sharp, shooting pain racing along her arm. Pain swamped her, and then impact sent a wave of pain over her. Her vision blacked out for a moment, and she lay there, just breathing desperately until she could see again. Cradling her throbbing arm, she gingerly sat up.

That had been too closeIf she'd landed wrong, she could have broken her neck or her back instead of just an armand now what was she going to do? How could she hide a cast as Saint Tail? How was she going to explain this to her parents? How could she pull **anything** off? Asuka Jr. would certainly put two and two together–

Asuka–Where was he?

Her fearful eyes landed on a figure lying nearby, unmoving.

NO!

Ignoring the pain, she managed to crawl over to him, face paling even further. He was white as a sheet–but that couldn't mean he was **dead,** could it? 

Blood darkening the side of his head answered that, along with a piece of a branch close by. He'd hit his head. She could see him breathing still and, placing a trembling hand on his chest, she felt his heart still beating steadily. He would live; even if he had a concussion, he'd still gotten off easier than she had.

But stillif she hadn't sent that calling cardIf she hadn't come for the vaseif she'd been more careful about her diversions–there was something she could have done, and he wouldn't have been hurt.

She'd done it at first to help peoplethen it had turned into a game between her and Asuka Jr., though she also was in it for the lost lambs. StillIt wasn't what it once was. She had grown careless, and here was the result: both of them seriously hurt–they both probably had broken ribs (hers sure felt like they were broken, at least).

Tears slowly rolling down her cheeks, she leaned forward and kissed his forehead. His eyes were fluttering open, but it was too dark to see her clearly. 

"Wha?" He gazed blearily up at her shadowed face, sight blurring for some reason. His head also hurt. A lot. "What happened?"

"We fell," she said quietly. Her voice was tight and choked from what sounded like pain andtears?

"Are you hurt?" he asked, now realizing she could have been injured. [AN: A little slow on the uptake, ain't he? Well, a concussion will do that to ya]

Gloved fingers brushed his cheek. "I'm so sorry," she whispered. "I'm stopping. Don'tfollow me anymore."

And then she was gone. 

Meimi barely made it to her house that night, hanging onto the balloons with one arm that had felt too much abuse. She'd tied the vase to her skirt and managed to leave it on the true owner's windowsill, then dazedly floated home. She'd barely made it to the roof when her arm gave out and she slid down onto the shingles.

Her mother, hearing the thump and still retaining her own abilities, was naturally the first one to climb onto the roof, only to find her tear-soaked daughter sitting there in full Saint Tail regalia, the balloons floating away into the sky. 

"I'm sorry, Mom," she said weakly. "I'mSaint Tail."

"Honey, we always knew," Eimi said worriedly. "How many girls with your color hair and magic and thieving skills can there be in our town? Now **what** have you done to your arm?"

"I fell." Meimi looked blearily at her mother. "But I'm not doing it anymoreI nearly got Asuka Jr. and me killed tonight, I've gotta stop."

"Don't worry about it, dear." The woman picked up her daughter and neatly walked down the house roof and onto the patio's roof, where her father was waiting, and handed her down. Her mother got her into a normal set of clothes while coming up with an excuse for Meimi's arm with her father, who was standing on the other side of the door. 

They ended up telling the doctor she'd fallen down the stairs and hit her arm on the banister. Her classmates asked her at school, and some people signed her cast, but after the cast was gone the incident was forgotten. 

But Saint Tail was gone. Meimi hated it–she wanted to get out there and **do** something, but yet the risk was too great. If it could be solved by the police, she'd let them handle it.

Asuka Jr. was famous–he'd put a halt to Saint Tail's shenanigans and was in high demand now for detective work, even though he hadn't brought her in. She was glad she'd furthered his career, buthe was changed, as was she. There was no more Saint Tail, and it was depressing both of them, but that was the way it had to be.

The night really was the better time of the twenty-four hours, Meimi reflected. She must have inherited her love of it from her mother, along with her thieving skillsToo bad she had to have a heart thrown in with the mix, or she'd be filthy rich right about then

But she wasn't. She was seventeen, single, wanted by every _single_ guy in the whole confounded high school _except_ the one she wanted, semi-popular, doing better in school now that her mind wasn't preoccupied with how to pull off that night's stuntsand utterly miserable. 

Still, the knowledge that the boys lived for her gym period was somewhat gratifying. Or at least, it had been–the school nurse had finally requested that she be allowed to practice in a private training room. This was on the grounds that between 1:25 and 2:30–her gym period–the nurse had had to treat the entire male population of Seika Catholic High School for nosebleeds three weeks in a row and going on a fourth. 

Meimi could hardly resist asking the nurse if any of the boys had been Asuka Jr.

She turned away from the window and flopped onto her bed. Ruby squeaked and climbed onto her forehead, then curled up into a ball and rolled down Meimi's nose, launching into the air and landing with another triumphant squeak on her stomach. Meimi smiled slightly and tickled her hedgehog's nose, but her thoughts were elsewhere. Particularly on a certain seventeen-going-on-eighteen-soon detective with the most unique hair color she'd ever seen. [AN: Forgive me, it's just that in the manga his hair is GREEN. You don't see _that_ in a Catholic school every dayI think?] How she missed those days where she'd look and he'd be behind her, always chasing her; yet if she fell back she knew he'd catch her. She _wanted_ to send him those calling cards, little promises to meet at night, even if it wasn't the most conventional kind of meeting. She'd loved it when he'd told Lina that he didn't want to know her identity until _he_ caught her, when he'd taken that bet with Lina to get her off her back, when he'd finally seized that calling card out of Lina's hand. She loved him, and maybe he had loved her

But that was over now.

Ruby had made her way back to the top of the pillow, obviously in hopes of ski-jumping off Meimi's nose again, but Meimi foiled her plans by turning over and looking her pet in the eye. "Normal girls don't have to put up with this, you know," she muttered. "They don't have the strangest combination of people for parents and crushes on their arch nemeses. Wellmaybe not, Rosemary was kinda my arch-nemesis, but not really. I don't know." Ruby squeaked. "Whatever. Point is, normal girls don't have to put up with this."

Ruby gave her the your life would kill an ordinary girl' look.

"You're too darn smart for a hedgehog," Meimi shot back, flipping onto her back once more, to which Ruby responded by clambering onto her head and rolling off her nose once more.

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Meimi walked into the classroom with a yawn. She hadn't fallen asleep until long after she was supposed to, yet she didn't know why. For whatever reason, she was just getting a creepy feeling, and it was bothering her.

She sat down wearily without going to talk to her friends like normal. It was just one of _those_ mornings.

"Hey, Haneoka, you look _awful,_" came a cheerful greeting.

She buried her face in her arms–partially to hide her blush–and growled, "Go _away,_ Asuka Jr." 

"And a good morning to you," he returned. She could hear his chair–his seat was coincidentally next to hers–scrape across the floor and the rustle of cloth as he sat down. _"Someone's_ a merry little sunshine."

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"Someone's an annoying pain where the sun don't shine," she retorted, lifting her face to send a glare his way. "Don't you have somewhere to go? Anywhere? France, maybe?"

"Not this year." He leaned back with a frown on his face.

"Aren't you the bluebird of happiness," Meimi said dourly. He normally wasn't _this_ down in the dumps. "What's _with_ you? Someone spike your coffee?"

"Always a possibility, but I doubt it." Shifting forward, he rested his chin on his palm. "The mayor of Tokyo faxed my boss yesterday afternoon. He heard about the Saint Tail case and some others, and they want me to come work for them. If the chief'll transfer me, I'll be hitting the big city for some work soon."

Meimi was having a very hard time breathing, but she finally managed to choke out, "Thatsounds nice."

"Yeah, I don't know if I want to go or not. It sounds like a big break for me." An unreadable look came into his eyes, but he said nothing more.

"I'm sure it would be." She hid her face in her arms again, but this time it was to hide her horrified expression. Leaving? For _Tokyo?_ And a detective–he could get hurt!

A hand came down on her shoulder, and Seira's voice whispered into her ear. "Meimi, I need you to come to the confessional this afternoon. It's urgent." She was gone as soon as she'd come, and Meimi found herself at even more of a loss than before. 

The Sister came in and everybody hurried into their seats, chattering away; Meimi opened her textbook dazedly. It was time for Math.

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The news of Asuka's possible departure was weighing heavily on her as she let herself into St. Paulia church and hurried towards the confessional. Couldn't he see what he'd be missing? He'd be leaving his father, his friends–her! He'd be leaving all of them behind!

Of course, maybe he was doing it to get away from Lina

"Seira?" She peeked inside the confessional.

"I'm here. Please come in, Meimi."

Meimi entered, setting her book bag down and sitting with a sigh. The small room seemed even smaller than when she'd seen it lastbut that had been around three years ago. "What's up?"

"I know you decided you didn't want to do this anymore, Meimi," Seira said, sounding uncertain for once. "ButThere is a problem."

"What are you talking about, Seira?" Her face was hard to see through the lattice between them.

"I overheard a conversation at a restaurant between the police chief and a detective from Sakuraoka. There are quite a few cases where someone has been cheated or swindled out of something valuable–or so they claim–and there's no way to prove it, or they haven't caught the person responsible–"

"I know what you're going to say, Seira." The nun-in-training could see her friend's head bowed, masking her expression. "You want me to become Saint Tail again."

"Meimi–only if you want to."

To her surprise, the redheaded girl gave her a big smile, and behind her blue eyes she could see plans already starting to form. "This solves more than those cases," she said happily. 

"Oh yes, Asuka Jr.I see. If Saint Tail returns, he may be assigned to track you down once more." This was working out better than she had imagined "So you will help these people? I can't."

"Yes, I will." Meimi was grinning from ear-to-ear.

"Then this is the situation"

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Asuka Jr. stared at the assignment in front of him in the library. He didn't have any cases to work on right then, and his boss had given him the afternoon off, so here he was, studying History. He'd never cared for it–who really thought about what some god-forsaken country the size of a cow pasture was doing in the early 1600's, anyway? Not anyone with a social life or a job, that was for sure–but the teachers certainly did.

He really wasn't favoring this possible transfer to Tokyo; it would take him away from his hometownand Meimi. This was not the kind of thing he wanted, but refusing it would tank his career.

Meimi hovered around the bookcase behind him, wondering what she could do. She'd stopped by home to pick up a few supplies, but there were so many ways she could do this

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In 1632, Gildfret the Plunderer, who was noted for the ability to juggle small animals and children and an obsession with chewing on his own hand, gathered nomadic forces to enforce him as he usurped the throne of his uncle's brother's wife's kitchen maid's midwife's miller's grandmother's king. He was unsuccessful and repeatedly tried, each time failing miserably, until he finally gave up and fled to the north, where he founded

Asuka just _knew_ he was going to fall asleep. His eyelids were drifting closed

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Squeak!

Something bounced off his head and landed with another high-pitched squeak on his open textbook. Was thatIt squeaked again as he picked it up. It wasa chew toy? No, more like a plushy _meets_ a chew toyof him. Him chibi-stylein rubber.

It burst in a shower of confetti, and in his hands was left a card. His heart started racing, and he flipped it over.

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Tonight, I will come back.

**Saint *Tail**

"No way," he said aloud, eyes wide as saucers.

Another rubber-chibi bounced off his head and he caught it. It burst, this time spraying him with bubbles, leaving another card.

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Way.

**Saint*Tail**

This was not his life.

"Show yourself, you coward!" he yelled. Immediately the librarian sat straight up, sending him a look that would have turned a lesser soul to stone. He, however, paid no heed.

One more chibi dropped out of nowhere, popping on impact and covering him in pink fluff. He grimaced and read the card.

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As you wish–tonight, I will come for the black pearl necklace at the Mineyama house.

**Saint*Tail**

Meimi watched him fume, smothering giggles, waited for a count of ten, picked a book off the shelf to have a pretense, and walked out. "My goodness, Asuka Jr., I must say that pink is not your color."

"Huh?" He started, then blushed a brilliant hue that surpassed the pink. "Oh–that–"

"Looks like you got caught in a blender along with a strawberry milkshake," she commented dryly. "Or pink Styrofoam. What happened?"

"Saint Tail" he said thoughtfully. Then something clicked in his mind.

Before she knew it, he had picked her up by the waist and spun her around. "The boss is gonna let me stay! He has to–no one else knows her case like I do!" Breathless, he set her down.

"That's wonderful!" He was _happy_ he was going to stay!

At that moment, for Meimi, all was right in the world.

Then both of them realized that a) they were extremely close b) they had just acted like they were going out and c) his arms were still around her. With those facts in mind, they sprang apart, blushing furiously, him muttering something about getting in touch with the chief and her mumbling something about talking to Seira. Within seconds they had hurried off in opposite directions, and silence reigned in the library.

Meimi leaned against the wall of the library, cheeks still burning. Then she remembered his face when he'd gotten all three of the calling cards, and a slow smile spread across her face. 

Saint Tail was back in business.

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This would make an okay one-shot, but I'm not gonna just leave it there–there's so much potential! Until the next chapter, dear readers! (All two of you.)


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